Father charges at disgraced doctor

Reuters
Sunday, February 04, 2018

CHARLOTTE, Mich. - The enraged father of three daughters who were sexually abused by Larry Nassar charged towards the former USA Gymnastics national team doctor and tried to attack him during a sentencing hearing in a Michigan courtroom on Friday.

The father, Randall Margraves, was nearly within striking distance of Nassar before officers tackled him roughly to the ground in front of his shocked daughters. The judge later accepted Margraves' account that he "lost control" of his emotions and said she would not punish him.

The chaotic scene began after sisters Lauren and Madison Margraves had finished tearful victim statements on the second day of a sentencing hearing in Eaton County, much as nearly 200 women, including Margraves' third daughter, did in earlier court sessions. Standing alongside his daughters and wife, Margraves, a tall man with an intense gaze dressed in an electricians' union sweatshirt, then asked to speak.

"I would ask you as part of the sentencing to grant me five minutes in a locked room with this demon," he said to the judge, gesturing towards Nassar, who has already been sentenced to up to 175 years in prison at an earlier hearing after pleading guilty to molesting young women under the guise of medical treatment.

Judge Janice Cunningham told him he knew she could not do that, and chastised him after he called Nassar a son of a bitch.